I am Done with False Humility

Some of us are plagued by it. Some suffer so badly from it that they literally abandon themselves emotionally and physically. False humility is perhaps one of the most unrecognized and insidious forms of the ego’s unconscious self-attack. I feel a great desire to write about this because I am the one who needs to read it. And re-read it. Over and over.

I asked Spirit to have my blocks to the awareness of Love’s presence healed. That meant allowing these often painful blocks to surface so they could be first seen with Spirit and then released in exchange for the miracle. In 2012 a series of related situations occurred that not only upset me but left me totally bewildered. I won’t be naming anyone here because ultimately the problem was in my own mind and therefore it was only my own perception that required healing.

The underlying theme of these situations was that I felt judged by others’ and sometimes downright attacked. And the instigating factor was always the same too. I would follow my passion, allowing Spirit to flow through me in whatever it was that I said or did. Another way to say this is that I would boldly step forward to follow my inner initiatives. But invariably there would be a backlash. My seemingly radical and assertive proclamations often triggered others’ ego’s. And the outcome was a projection of resentment or anger toward me. The key feelings it raised for me were rejection and total bewilderment. And these were very deeply seated feelings, ones that seemed to come from a distant past.

This painful ego pattern, one that I was sure I had already overcome, decided to escalate during 2012 and 2013. The purpose (as always) was so it could be seen in order to be healed completely. But I couldn’t quite forgive it until now, because I had not been ready to recognize the ego’s hidden belief, the one that I needed to witness with Spirit in order for it to be fully forgiven and healed. All I knew until recently was that this pattern of rejection and bewilderment triggered deep feelings of insecurity and danger about expressing myself fully and authentically.

Needless to say, I have felt significant inner conflict at times over this past year concerning this confusing issue. During this time I have also been a conduit for Spirit in writing this paradigm-shifting book, The End of Death and a co-facilitator of our life-changing workshops; yet as I look back I’m stunned to find that I have deliberately restricted myself from wholeheartedly unleashing and expressing what feels like a tsunami of Divine Wisdom. Not Nouk’s wisdom but Spirit’s Wisdom. Why?

Why have I been holding back? Why did I restrain and censor what Spirit had to say through me? Why did I judge myself so harshly? Why did I put other’s (ego) needs above my own? Why did I compromise myself for others? And why did I deliberately turn my own inner light down in the company of others?

Well then let’s answer these questions! I had been holding back, censoring and restraining my Holy Self because I believed what the ego had told me; that if I spoke my truth then I would be rejected and attacked. I judged myself so harshly because it kept me small. The ego said that keeping myself small meant I’d be safe from attack while flying under the radar.

Until very recently I still compromised myself for certain individuals, putting their ego needs above my own inner wisdom. The ego’s advice again; “If you listen to your own inner wisdom you will surely be alienated and attacked. Your inner wisdom will leave you isolated, confused and bereft of Love. Best to conform to the status quo and always attempt to please other’s ego’s. Besides, your needs are not as important as others. Being good is spiritual. Serving your own needs is selfish.”

How did this ego pattern serve the ego? And what did it keep me from?

This old pattern, had it endured, would have kept me stuck in my false self with its insane beliefs and values. I would have never known the immense security and power of my true Identity; my Holy Self. Additionally, not recognizing my Holy Self meant that I would never recognize another’s true Identity either. Hence the Love and safety I sought in others would never be found and kept, because I wouldn’t have been able to accept firstly that this Love and safety was within my Self.

This ego pattern of false humility kept me from discovering real Love, true union, joy, liberation, infinite security and inner peace. It diverted my attention from seeing that all perceived judgment or attack arose from just one source, within my own mind. Sneakily the ego managed to stop me from recognizing the real source of my suffering so that it would not be healed. While I believe my suffering is caused by others then I’ll never locate its true origin and will consequently reject real healing. Note: See the forgiveness/Atonement process here

In the past when I believed the ego’s false humility I would literally abandon myself. When I compromised myself for another, I would leave myself; sometimes emotionally and sometimes physically. I would reject my own inner promptings and dishonor my Self. I didn’t realize that to dishonor my own inner wisdom was to reject God’s Love, to deny God’s Will for me.

When I delved even deeper into my radical self inquiry, I found that my false humility was really supreme arrogance in disguise. After all, the Self that I had tried to diminish, the one that I was so accustomed to compromising for others, was none less that my God Self. I realized that by playing small, by buying into the ego’s judgment of my inadequacy and unworthiness, I was shutting out God’s Love. The ultimate in arrogance. And I saw clearly that the ego’s smallness and the Holy Self’s greatness were completely and mutually exclusive. While we’re in one we reject the other.

False humility is highly esteemed by the ego. As such it is one of the last great defenses against God that we willingly relinquish. Why? Because without this false sense of self, we would discover that we are God’s Self – perfect and eternally guiltless.

I was stunned by my recent clashes with this old ego pattern of false humility. I had a one month teaching tour in Europe and alarmingly, I experienced four instances where I abandoned myself through attempting to compromise for others. The heat of my ego issue most certainly got turned up and instead of trusting, I fell into despair. I slid into the belief that something went wrong; because I was wrong. And I couldn’t seem to extricate myself from this hopeless ego belief.

Not until later did I recall a very important point. One that I talk about in my previous book, Take Me to Truth. Part of the ego’s earlier phase of undoing involves withdrawing our blame onto others, the past and the world. We begin to recognize that these are simply ego smoke screens projected outward to obscure discovery of the one source of all suffering, which is our own hidden guilt expressed as unconscious self-hatred.

But the part that I totally forgot about was this; that as we withdraw blame from the outside (as I did with my perceived adversaries), the ego cunningly turns the blame within. Hence the escalation of my cruel self-judgment. But as Jesus explains in A Course in Miracles, self-judgment is just as destructive as judgment of others.

After what seemed like forever I called my dear friend Sparo. Suddenly, with her help it all made sense. She helped me to reframe and to recognize the gift beneath the ego’s story. No wonder the heat got turned up on this issue. Obviously I was ready to have it healed once and for all! I see now that this particular issue represents a significant chunk of the ego’s core belief structure and I am grateful to have had it show up so forcefully – so as I finally chose to heal it, once and for all!

A short time ago, during the aftermath of one of these instances where I abandoned myself, I had a flash of memory. It surfaced as a feeling first until I questioned it more deeply. This most recent attack felt so familiar, so close. And then I saw it. My mother loved me when I was feeling defeated, sad or sick. And she punished me when I shone, the times I was happy or content. From this I learned to be small, to turn my light down while secretly resenting the people I sought to please. Seeing this so clearly helped me to make sense of the crippling pattern that I seemed to attract; the one that left me feeling rejected and bewildered. Now I recognized the ego’s hidden belief, this one that I needed to witness with Spirit in order for it to be fully forgiven and healed. And genuine relief and gratitude were the result.

I am learning that true humility, contrary to the ego’s pseudo version, comes from God. It is the willingness to question the false self and its intent. And it’s the courage to stay true to our Holy Self in the face of temptation. True humility emerges as we drop our ego beliefs, values, roles and conditioning. If this process is followed through then all that remains is God’s Self, our Holy Self; the Self that God created. And there is no conflict in this Self, only joy, Love and peace. True humility is the declaration and demonstration that we know “Who” everyone is because we recognize them first by looking within. And seeing only Love within we see only Love in everyone.

Joyful Update

I am overjoyed to include this wonderful update as of 2016. Giving this self-judgment over to Spirit via the Atonement, and practicing the truly valuable 7 Key Principles of Holy Relationship…I no longer suffer from that dreadful sense of inadequacy (false humility).

I am the light of the world…(Lesson 61 in A Course in Miracles)

“Who is the light of the world except God’s Son? This, then, is merely a statement of the truth about yourself. It is the opposite of a statement of pride, of arrogance, or of self-deception. It does not describe the self-concept you have made. It does not refer to any of the characteristics with which you have endowed your idols. It refers to you as you were created by God. It simply states the truth.” W-61.1.

“To the ego, today’s idea is the epitome of self-glorification. But the ego does not understand humility, mistaking it for self-debasement. Humility consists of accepting your role in salvation and in taking no other. It is not humility to insist you cannot be the light of the world if that is the function God assigned to you. It is only arrogance that would assert this function cannot be for you, and arrogance is always of the ego.” W-61.2.

“True humility requires that you accept today’s idea because it is God’s Voice which tells you it is true. This is a beginning step in accepting your real function on earth. It is a giant stride toward taking your rightful place in salvation. It is a positive assertion of your right to be saved, and an acknowledgment of the power that is given you to save others.” W-61.3.

” I am the light of the world. That is my only function. That is why I am here.” W-61.5:3-5.

38 Comments

Dear Nouk, deep gratitude to you for writing about this deep issue. The abandonment can happen so quickly that everything is shut down before we know what attacked the mind. On some days the writing of ‘my’ book comes in a flood, as you say. And on other days, clearly the mind has attacked itself. Thanks so much!

The question is not having humility or not, but that the ego doesn’t exist at all, as stated in ACIM “God did create spirit in His own thought and of a quality like His own.There is nothing else.” If we focus on the qualities of the ego we are feeding the illusion instead of letting it go.

Yes Paulo, however the ego (while it is 100% illusion) is so incredibly insidious and crafty that we MUST be brave enough to exhume all its values, beliefs, and conditioning in order to raise these lies to Spirit to have them healed. While we still believe in it (ego), and live our lives from it, it cannot be forgive, healed. If we don’t raise every belief we have to the light, then we end up doing a spiritual bypass which is quite common. And this bypassing brings a lot more suffering.
Blessings,
Nouk

Humility consists of accepting our role in salvation and accepting no others. My visual version of this is to see my body as God’s Communication Tool only. Lately in my version, is alot of false humility in the form of “why me?”, “Too Tired”, “not good enough” and there is always support from ego on all of these. The good news, “i” am not responsible for any of “my issues” since I am just sitting in the drivers seat and this vehicle is fully automated by God. As was expressed in an ACIM meeting when I shared “Your” image of one foot in each boat, God’s and egos. “SINK THE EGO BOAT” Thank you for your process. As you share I get leap frogged ahead in my video!!

Radical teaching! I can recognize my own ego patterns which are insidious, tricky and even ingenious. Yes, bringing them to the light because we ARE the LIGHT.
I am so thankful being on this path of awakening together with you and all the other beautiful souls in theONE <3

Great article, as always. You are right, false humility is one of the biggest lies and one of the most insidious patterns that has to be undone on this path. I had to deal a lot with this over the past years and I completely relate to what you are saying.

What I recently learned is that rejection and fear of rejection are ego’s tools to reject God’s Love; it is the mechanism that creates poverty at all levels, by rejecting God’s Love and building the belief in lack. Therefore, natural receiving turns into taking/getting fueled by the belief in lack and limitation. Since receiving is blocked by fear, our giving is also blocked and isntead of freely giving, we enter the pattern of holding. So, instead the natural flow of receiving/giving God’s Love, we turn into taking/holding pattern that creates a false feeling of security since it is powered by fear.
The receiving aspect of us is of female nature and the giving aspect is of male nature.It turns out to me that freeing this two channels of receiving and giving is acomplished by total forgiveness of our mothers and fathers. Once this is accomplished the female and male energies can be unleashed and mixed up into Love.
As Jesus says in ACIM, our function is to freely receive and give the Love that continously flows from God. But both our receiving and giving are closed by fear. We need to open them through total forgiveness of our parents and to completely unleash and integrate the female and male energies, which are now suppressed.
All the best,

A beautiful statement. Your path to yourself, I wish for you There are as many paths, as there are human beings. A poim? Silence No Action Let Go Feel The Space That You Are What Do You Experience Only LOVE for ALL With That You ARE !!!!!!!!

Hi Nouk, This is powerful. I can’t wait to meet you and experience Spirit liberated within you in Portland. I don’t want to hold anything back and your reflection of my commitment to overcoming ego is challenging me. I’m facing my resistance and know I have been guided to the perfect place, time and people for me to do this work.
Love and great blessing, Mary Ann

Thanks for taking the courage to look at the ways that you have held yourself back. I can relate. I recently saw how my own `hiding` from God was up for question, and it is stepping out into the light to be SEEN, to be VISIBLE, that takes you of hiding. When we hide we think we are actually visible, that everyone can see us, that they’re all judging and condemning us, and that we’re really obvious and very exposed, meaning we try to hide even more and it just gets worse. The more you hide the more you feel exposed and vulnerable.

This has been a major lesson for me, starting off this lifetime with a profound dose of painful shyness which has gradually eroded over the years as I’ve `come out` of my shell, as they say. I too had a mother who tended to be emotionally illiterate and cold and cherished/nurtured only when there was sickness or failure and at all other times repressed and controlled the living shit out of everything. So I’ve had to become aware of that and forgive her for what she hasn’t done, and forgive myself for my use of her, and therefore see how I’ve simply used others to hide from who I am and therefore from God.

It is only when you come out of hiding that you become truly visible, you can see others for how they are and they can see your true self. And then you strangely enough do not feel exposed, or vulnerable, or attackable. Standing in the innocent light of God you are wholly protected and alive and aware of what is, able to see again! Able to look at what is and accept it with a smile, freed from your own self-imprisonment and enslavement to self-made isolation. It’s funny how when you’re isolated you feel much more attacked/attackable than when you reveal your true self.

I have sisters also who grew up in the same household dynamic with shyness and hiding being a huge feature. The disallowing of emotional expression was an unspoken family rule and therefore all of us had to totally shut down and hide our feelings when a certain person was around. We used her to learn how to hide, and I can tell you there was a profound degree of people-pleasing and false humility going on – being `nice`, smiling to try to keep others happy, never telling anyone how you really feel, keeping it all inside and feeling alone. Enough of that crap!

As you continue to peek out of your shell and step out of the cave and feel the warmth of God’s light smiling upon you, you’ll know you are Home once again 🙂

I just wanted to add that symbolically speaking, home is OUTDOORS… we build homes and houses and nests to hide way from the world, and put clothes on to hide our bodies, and hide inside our bodies, and hide in our heads, and put up all these walls to not be exposed, when is is that very hiding that makes you feel threatened. I’m not saying we should all be running around naked in public but, the ego has built that symbolism into our typical lifestyles.

Also I was going to say, one of my sisters has a major problem of agoraphobia (fear of going out) and fear of strangers and fear of sickness and various obsessive compulsions at this time, and it has become clear to me that the more she hides the worse she gets. The more we avoid God, the more afraid we become. The more we `stay home` in our isolation and avoid the `out there`, we make the `out there` become scarier and more terrifying… but it is the isolation that does this to our minds, driving us insane.

So anyway, here’s to stepping out into the symbolic sun and letting yourself be fully accepted by God’s love 😀

Very helpful,Paul; thank you for sharing this. I enjoyed reading your comments as I relate to your emotional experience of suppression. Coming out of hiding is the resolution of the process indeed. We have to drop off all the fear,guilt and hatred so that we can come out and express ourselves. This is a road from suppression to expression.
Best,
leonard

Does this mean that I will be reading “The End of Death” in the near future? I hope so because we sorely need it in this world.

I just did healing work with Stacy and in the process became aware of when as a little girl of 5 years old I decided it was not safe to let my light shine because it brought out intense anger in my mother. With Stacy holding space, and in the presence of Love, these beliefs were bathed in Light.

Now an hour or so later I find my way to your article on false humility validating the experience and giving me greater understanding of its crippling effects.

I will add that this healing was not accomplished through my thinking brain where the ego can set off alarms, but 18 inches below and with a new way of communicating with Spirit. Also a new language my ego doesn’t understand. It’s like speaking in pig Latin like we did in high school so our parents wouldn’t have a clue of what we said.

Nelson Mandela said in a speech “when we let our light shine, we give others permission to do the same.” This can spread so that we are all shining!

Beautiful Linda! Thank you for sharing. How perfect. Stacy is gifted with helping people to go within; to that place where there is direct union with the Holy Self. And what a relief that is. I am so happy for you. Keep it up…Pig Latin is the best language ever!
With Love,
Nouk

Yea Nouk!! You did it again! Your writing of your experiences and learning/growth spurts brings us all with you as One Mind recognition. Thank you thank you and I too, with my sister Mary Ann, look forward to the Pprtland retreat with you, et al. Love love!

Thank you for your post Nouk. It was very timely for me and it helped me see very clearly the pattern I’ve been struggling with also. The defence mechanisms of keeping low profile and playing nice truly are attack mechanisms, attacks against my Self, held in place by the fear that crap starts to fly and my peace is disturbed every time I live in truth openly. Just today something came up again, something that tried to justify my fear, but now it is time to let that thing go. So thank you again, your sharing made it lot easier.

This somehow reminds me how Jesus gave an ultimate demonstration (or at least it seems ultimate to me)about miracle-minded forgiveness at the end of his bodily journey. It really doesn’t matter if someone attacks your body or not. Or as he puts it in the course: “The statement ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do’ in no way evaluates what they do. It is an appeal to God to heal their minds. There is no reference to the outcome of the error. That does not matter.”

Oh Nouk! How painful it was to watch you struggling when I could see within you the True Source of all healing, that is, God’s Love, which you so readily offer to others, but sometimes did not offer to yourself. And of course I can relate, being a ‘card-carrying member’ of the ‘abused-by-a-mother’ club. How very pervasive and insidious was the ego’s early deciding for smallness for us. How confusing to be shut down when you ‘knew the Truth’ as even a young child, but got no earthly validation. Yet how much more willing have we both become to see a ‘better way’ after enduring the decades of ‘contrast’. I was so evious of the kids with perfect television moms as a young kid. I could not understand my ‘bad luck’ in getting the mom I got stuck with. And it was through the salvation of, first, healing through the 12 Step group for families of alcoholics, Al-Anon Family Groups, then the amazing strength uncovered through ACIM and finally now through conscious contact with Holy Spirit that my salvation looms larger. I now see my part in ‘miscreating’ the self-attack and can choose to gove it to Spirit to undo. Halle-honkin’-lujah! Eureka! It is Given. *see you shining more brightly today in my Minds eye* Love, T

Dear Nouk,
I barely now you, I just started the course but I dis your prayer (with scarcity) and the phone rang for someone wanted to rent my apartment. I want to thank you for your generosity and your openness. and huge honesty. I love you 😉 I have a silly question: since I have trouble being disciplined with the repetition of the frases (like every hour) would you suggest me to buy a watch that rings every hour to help me be more disciplined? A big hug from Quebec city ! Maite Mardomingo

Dear Maite,
I am so happy for you! Yes…if you need a watch with an hourly alarm to remind you, then do it. I tied a piece of red string to my wrist for a year, to remind myself to always CHOOSE AGAIN.
Love you, Big hug,
Nouk 🙂

Thank you Nouk. I have been experiencing this of late yet feeling more comfortable with others having different opinions than mine. God has also been playing ‘you are my sunshine ☀️ my only sunshine’…to me these past few days as I moved through 2 seeming attacks on my expression…I too can relate to your childhood story. ☮️????

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About Nouk

Nouk Sanchez is a beacon of Light among the many wonderful teachers of A Course in Miracles. Her unconditional Love and depth of wisdom awaken a safe and uncompromising space for students to safely explore hidden fears and blocks to God’s Love.

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Our aim is to help people recognize and undo the one cause of all suffering: the ego (aka – fear). By providing resources, education and mentoring, our intent is to empower individuals with the means to trust in their Divine Teacher within.

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